Before summarizing this week's lecture, there are anouncements. There will be a coordinator's meeting at 6:30 pm on Sunday at Irving's Bagels on W. College Ave. Anyone is welcome to come. These are the two upcoming lecture series events to be held at 7:30 pm in 102 Health and Human Development:

• Act 199: Censoring Pennsylvania's Universities -- November 10
  Act 199 prohibits alcohol ads in any periodical published by, for, or in behalf of any education institution. An ACLU lawyer will come to talk about it. On Thursday, Nov. 11, Free Talk Radio on WKPS (90.7 FM) will have a discussion on this topic. Our own Julian Catchen is the "token liberal" on the show, which is from 5:30-6:00 pm every Tuesday and Thursday. All three radio personalities on the show, although from different political viewpoints, are anti-Act199.
• Leases, Landlords and What to do After -- November 17
  Protect yourself when signing a lease. Learn what to do if you believe your rights have been violated. Someone from Keystone Legal Services will be coming to talk about this.

DR. CARY FRASER ON AFFIRMATIVE ACTION
On Wednesday evening Dr. Cary Fraser of the Department of African and African American Studies spoke about affirmative action. He grew up in South America and attended the University of Geneva. One of the courses Dr. Fraser teaches is about the impact of race on foreign affairs, a subject on which he is also writing a book.

To first give a brief summary, Dr. Fraser talked about race in society, education, and in political parties. He talked about segregation, colorblind applications, and creating diversity at a university. As a father, he has had to deal with instances of discrimination and segregation in the public school regarding his daughter. He handed out very poignant cartoons about racism that were created by Herblock in the 1950s. Following the lecture was a long, respectful discussion about affirmative action and segregation. It seemed like the discussion and sharing of different viewpoints of people from very different educational backgrounds and ethnicities gave each person involved something new to ponder. That is the very purpose of the lecture series.

Before the lecture, Dr. Fraser was asked why generally people (whites) think Native Americans should be compensated because their land was stolen, why people sympathize with them, whereas people (whites) don't generally think African Americans should be compensated for slavery. He responded by saying that whites think of what happened to the Native Americans as stealing from them something better(beautiful unpolluted land and water) than what we have given them (dirty, poverty-ridden reservations). However, the white supremacist, ethnocentric view is that whites have given blacks a better living in America than they had in Africa.

Dr. Fraser was also asked about multi-cultural groups. There was an editorial article in The Collegian that talked a little about multi-cultural groups, as well. The question is whether their activites are meant to be open to everyone or whether they are non-overtly trying to be exclusive. If they are actually being exclusive, then the student activity fee shouldn't cover their exclusionary activities, right? Dr. Fraser said that self-affirmation if members within a multi-cultural group is fine. If their intention is to avoid mainstream culture or to be exclusive instead of sharing their culture, then it's a problem.

HISTORY
Dr. Fraser stated that the affirmative action debate is really a debate about black education. Before the mid-20th century, whites thought that giving blacks an education would give them an undue advantage in American society. Keeping blacks uneducated would help unsure the continuation of white domination of society. Blacks had been rendered invisible, residents in a society that conferred no citizenship. Education has been asked to bear the burden of transformation of our society.

Blacks have only been considered equal citizens in the U.S. for 34 years, less than 1/5 of our country's existence. Restructuring of American society began in the 1940s, largely during World War II. Before WW2, about 90% of blacks lived in the South. 55% moved to the North during WW2. Blacks could vote in the North, but the North was just as segregated as the South. Black suffrage transformed American politics. Before the 1930s, the Democratic Party was the party of white supremacy, with its voter base largely in the South. After the 1930s, the Democratic Party became the party of ethnic minorities linked to a conservative system. In the early 1960s came the realization that as a democratic society we should have participation of all groups. Affrimative action -- taking positive action to educate and employ minorities -- was born, although not made law. Since Reagan entered the White House, Republicans have been trying to reverse affirmative action. The civil rights era justices retired. Renquist, who had written a report in favor of the continuation of segregation was appointed. Today blacks are the largest minority. Hispanics will become the largest. And then whites will become a minority. Political reallignments will result. An example is in Texas where more than 1/3 of the electorate is Hispanic. Bush has been distancing himself from the Republican Party and speaking to crowds in Spanish. Both parties competing for the black vote gives blacks more leverage.

ROUND TABLE DISCUSSION
Whites offered minorities affirmative action. But rather than accepting it and moving forward, many have rejected it. Some blacks reject affirmative action because of the stigmatism that the less-qualified minority gets something instead of the more-qualified white. Despite these assumptions, affirmative action cannot be progressive if the people it was meant to help reject it and are even offended or resentful about it.

Is there a white culture or a black culture? Shouldn't it be just one American culture? Prominent blacks are cut-off from other blacks. Examples: Clarence Thomas and Collin Powell. Doesn't black culture value success and leadership at a national level? or just within their community? Isn't this attitude non-productive?

Why do seven-year-olds segregate themselves based on race? Who is responsible -- parents or teachers? Should kids have assigned seating at the lunch table? Would this anti-segregation approach be justified although it takes away kids' freedom to sit where they want? Everyone agreed that desegregation needs to start in elementary school while kids are still maleable. Too often, the attempt is not made until higher education, college when people already have embedded notions and lack of respect for other ethnic groups. College is the first time many people think beyond the boundaries of the neighborhoods where they grew up. You can be as racist as you want in your own home but not in public. Isn't that hypocrisy? Kids get confused by that. Some people from urban areas thought that desegregation was unsuccessful. Others thought it was somewhat successful.

Less than 49% of the population is white males, yet about 97% of senior management positions are held by white males. About 70% of the population still goes to segregated schools. Is it just chance where you go to school or is the segregation a conscious decision? The inequality of education in urban vs. suburban schools is not an accident -- it is a deliberate policy of municipal governments. When a school puts more kids in remedial education (usually blacks), the state gives the school more money which the school puts toward AP courses (eduacting whites who make up most of the students in advanced classes).

The two biggest discoveries made during the discussion were:

• Blacks are not grateful for affirmative action that whites gave them.
• Jews consider themselves a separate ethnic group from whites. But Catholics still counts as white, right? Darn, I wanted to be unique.

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